for the believer. could anything ever happen that could change your mind about god existing? non- believers. is there anything that could happen that would drop you to your knees and ask for help from a god that you dont believe in just case he is real and could help? be honest . thanks

Cool, a topic where maybe I won't go off topic..........as a non believer it would take an absolute 'miracle' for me to believe in a God, and even then I would still question it, even if some profound event happened like I heard him speak to me, I would question till the end that it was actually a God speaking to me. I do think other forces are at work in the Universe though but would and do question whether it was a God that was responsible for the spiritual event or whatever it was that happened to me. I do respect that others may accept God but to myself I cannot and do not want to believe in one. Even if my daughter had a terminal illness I would not pray to God to help her. I would instead hope with all my hope she got well but never pray. On the same token if it was proven without a doubt to me that a God existed I would then have to (reluctantly) change my mind.

There is actually nothing that would sway me from my faith, not a darn thing. Nothing. Nadda. Zip.

Not a thing.

As a "non-believer",I doubt that anything could ever change my mind.

I cannot easily believe anything without having some sort of good evidence being shown to me....and even then it would still take a while before I might begin to accept that something is possible.The only way something could change my mind quickly would be to have an overwhelming amount of good evidence presented to me from different areas.

True...some may say that if God were to show up and talk to them,they'd be more willing to change their mind.Others would still question whether or not it really was God.I am the sort that would automatically think that my imagination may have been attempting to play a trick on me...and would still question the incident(s).Too,I may think that "Hey...if that God exists...perhaps there are other gods that exist as well...".

But...I'd never drop to my knees and ask for help from any deity.I've made it this far through a lot of hard situations without any help from a deity.I'd rather rely on my own instincts,judgement and skills.

I'm half skeptic and half believer. Although I don't assume that God exists or doesn't exist I wouldn't worship him...and that will never change.

Yep.....Death... Once I die, God forbid , and I'm immediately transported to the pearly gates, then I'll have to do a lot of begging for forgiveness....

If I die and there's absolutely nothing, just an eternity of pitch black nothingness, then I'll curse that I was a good girl in life.....

If god came down to earth and shook my hand, I would believe. That's not much at all to ask an all mighty and all powerful being. I mean, he does want me to believe and go to heaven, right?

God is your hand. Only an orthodox Christian or Muslim version of God (and others) say that He(?) wants you to believe and go to heaven. What about the Sufi or Hindu notion that God is all and all is God, no separate entity from creation but a oneness of creation and intent. Infact they go higher than this by saying there is no all for God to be, nothing exists but God.

DITTO!

So, would anything sway you from your beliefs Brave?

If someone held a gun to my head and forced me to deny God, I would comply in an instant - with my fingers crossed.

Yes........the Truth would sway me from my beliefs.



Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha MAD POST!

OK, good answer.

I was interested because you sound so sure of your faith, I couldn't help but wonder.........

I am neither believer, nor non-believer. I don't accept "belief" as a viable mode of existence. We can only go by empirical proof and personal experience. I accept "God" as a highly likely probability. I am more of a "new-ager" or occultist than anything else. I see proof, I accept it. A typical example is "aliens". When asked if I believe in ufo's, I have to say "They are either real or not". I have had many spiritual experiences, first hand, to convince me of the existence of spirits, angels, and God/s. If I had not this "proof", I would remain open-minded. My experience, especially on this website, is that atheists and Xians are about equally closed-minded. To hell with both, I say! The real truth is beyond the imaginagination of both groups, and far more beautiful. Belief is irrelevant. "Jesus" appearing in front of me, unless in flesh and bone, would just be one more manifestation of spirit, no more powerful than another, just another thought-form. I have already seen Kuan Yin, Bridgit, and many others. I have been (although briefly) been visited by angels as clearly visible as the keyboard in front of me, and yes, been literally "touched". The only thing that would convince me would be a [u]physical[/u] manifestation of one being or another. Unless someone proved I was psychotic, I can't imagine it being proven that there was no God.

You can not stop believing what you have seen and felt and experienced, no matter what you do or think because it is a part of what you are inside.
If I personally wanted to deny the existence of God I would first have to deny my own truth and existence which is not possible because I am sitting here replying to you.
I wish I could give you all solid evidence for what is in my heart but its not meant to be that way for reasons I do not totally understand myself.
There is evidence of a Creator everywhere we look. There is plenty of documentation in the scriptures. And many to attest to the truth, but again these are but words to the non-believer.
It only becomes reasonable once you have seen the proof, but first you must come by faith and by faith alone

Irish

Would anything sway me? At the moment everything does.

I am trying to understand what I believe/don't believe at present, so everything is impacting upon what I believe.

Even once I know which direction I'm going in, I would hope I'd always be open to the truth... even if it wasn't what I wanted to hear.

Concerning the question itself... can we know if we'd be swayed away from our beliefs while we still hold them or believe we do? I had a chum who said he would never be turned from God, and only a few weeks later he was an atheist. Maybe he never believed, but he thought he did. So, before you can know if you'd be swayed you'd have to know if you truly believe, and he's proof that you can think you do when you most likely don't.

Oh Come on guys. You believers no damn well that if you died or had a vision or something of God being different than what you expected, You might change your mind around.

The non-believers too. If you met God, you would believe.

I don't think you could really get someone not to believe. Maybe about the particulars of that belief. I think you would have a much easier time going from not believing to believing.

I wonder what the psychological patterns associated with believers vs non believers are?

Interesting topic. I just posted a reply on another thread that is a great response to this one too:

What a wonderful post, Iams.

YUP!!! lol

This might not have anything to do with anything, to you; but I heard a song on the radio this morning, by Rhianna, I think it's a cover of that 80's song, "Tainted Love." Rhianna does a really cute version, and one of the lines is this:

"I'm the question, and you're of course, the answer."

That about sums it up.

Yea it does sum it up..I agree

I started out as a believer,..but soon realized I truly didn't believe, I was just afraid of the consequences of not believing, so I stopped all together. I figure its better to follow what you believe to be the truth to the end, than settle for whats convienent.

i want to thank everyone that honestly replied to this topic. it showed me at least what is in the hearts of some. without all the barriers up. it seems that are on the fence so to speak. as for me, if i was a non-believer and my child was laying in the hospital dying i would be on my face begging god to heal her. bump my pride. you never know what his answer will be but i would always wonder if my pride or whatever it was that stopped me from asking got in the way of prayer being answered. on the other hand i know of people that have prayed for things and god did not answer so they think he is not real. i have them in my family. i have seen a lot of things happen that i know god had a hand in it. i had breast cancer in 94 and the only way they found it was because i had a hernia. when i went to see the surgeon he sent me for a mammogram. i thought he was out of his mind and told my husband as much. well they found a lump that turn out to be cancer. i had the surgery for the hernia and a massectomy the same day. all of this happened in 5 days. now the dr. says if i hadnt got the hernia i would not have come to see him and he would not have found the lump. i ask him why he sent me for the mammo when i came in for a hernia. he pointed up. so i know god was there. thanks again guys.

I guess you could look at it that way but then wouldn't it also be reasonable to blame God for her being there in the first place in that case or is it just the good things God is responsible for? It's so weird the feelings I feel about God, I still really don't get how I feel about it all, this week I'm feeling particularly anti-god, but next week I might have had a different answer to your original question at the start of topic. Does anyone else feel this way sometimes, just so confused about the whole God thing? I have always been a non believer. If I say I don't believe, it would seem contradictory to me to then say I'd pray if really in need, but on the same hand, like you pointed out, what if I didn't and missed out on him answering me. It doesn't help that I get into these posts, now I'm more confused than ever before...

thank you for your honesty. for some reason god gets blamed for a whole lot of stuff. i have learn that god doesnt do the bad stuff to us but he does let things happen to us. i guess some would say thats the same thing. sometimes i think that bad stuff happens to us to get us to where we are so low that the only place we have to look is up. i have heard some say that everything bad that happens in the world is gods fault. if there was a god he would fix things. i think he gives us a free hand to see just how screwed up we can make things, and we have done a good job so far. imo i dont see what the big deal is. we cant frove to you that there is a god and you cant prove there isnt one. i just know that my god answers my prayers and i have seen some pretty strange stuff that i cant explain. so there is no way anything could happen to change my mind. if non-believers are right then it doesnt matter. if believers are right then there is going to be some really shocked people.

I'd be shocked to the core if believers are right but I think if non-believers are right, that it doesn't matter is a bit flippant. The whole world especially the Islamic world would be in meltdown.

My mum's an atheist, and nothing would make her believe in God - according to her - but she did say that when I was in hospital at the beginning of the year and she thought I might die she prayed to my God just in case he was listening. She still isn't a believer, but she said that she is not perfect, doesn't know everything (despite sometimes providing evidence to the contrary ), and her certainty that God doesn't exist doesn't mean he doesn't... if you see what I mean. She knows that I believe, so she prayed. She said "what the hell... if he's out there then maybe it helped, if not then it certainly didn't hurt).

She doesn't believe, but she wouldn't let that get in the way if that one action could affect the outcome of my illness.

It might seem contradictory, to pray to a God you still don't believe exists... but I think she'd have prayed to Buddha, every Egyptian god, even the great big banana in the sky if it might help her child.

I guess I am getting old and set in my ways. I don't think there is much that would sway my beliefs. The God Abrahamics follow is just one of many to me. If he came down a shook my hand I would more than likely say welcome to the pantheon, have some cakes and ale.

I like that. Do you do that just for gods... or can anyone have some?

No the cakes and ale are for all to enjoy. Eat, may you never know hunger. Drink, may you never know thirst.

i am talking about heaven and hell. the non-believers that think there is nothing after this. sorry

"non- believers. is there anything that could happen that would drop you to your knees and ask for help from a god that you dont believe in just case he is real and could help?"

So, if I'm reading this correctly, you are asking if a non-believer might "throw a prayer" on the off chance a god is listening, and NOT if god appeared before you, correct?


And I think the end of your statement should read " ....in case he is real and might decide to help". I say that just because the ones that god deigns to help ( according to believers), seems mighty capricious to me.


And, to answer the OP, the answer is "not that I'm aware of".

anyway, I would like to say that Uhmanduh and I were talking about this just this morning. I guess it would depend on how your prayer is delivered...and to whom or what it is being directed at. I do know of peolpe that "pray", but not to a God, it's more of a way to meditate, and try to come to conclusions on their own. Maybe this isn't technically prayer...but to me it seems like a form of prayer that is NOT directed towards a mythological being.

true Airika, if one's mind is focused, you can accomplish much.

And sometimes, if the cosmos and lady luck are in the mood..... your prayers might just be answered.

what i am asking is if there is something more important than your non-belief that would cause you to pray to god as maybe a last resort. like my husband has had 2 heart attacks. if the dr.s told me he was going to die and i did not believe in god would i humble myself enough to ask god for help or would me not believing get in the way of asking? on the other hand if i did pray and he died would that be enough to make me loose faith?

But why would I pray to something I don't believe in?

Besides, I hear people who talk about "God's plan" all the time. Supposedly, everything happens according to this mysterious plan. So if you pray, and something you dread happens anyway, is it because your prayer wasn't worthy enough? Or because answering your prayer went against gods plan?

Or, if you pray and the thing you dread doesn't happen, is it because your prayer was so worthy that god altered his plan? And if so, how solid is this plan after all?

My mum did pray when I was ill... and she still doesn't believe in God. I think it's just something desperate people do when they're out of other options... a mother will do pretty much anything to save a child. She'd have prayed to the big purple banana in the sky if she thought there was a trillionth of a chance that bananas answer prayers.

To each their own then.

[quote name='weareallsuckers' date='Mar 29 2007, 12:50 PM' post='1604610']
I'd be shocked to the core if believers are right but I think if non-believers are right, that it doesn't matter is a bit flippant. The whole world especially the Islamic world would be in meltdown.
[/quo

what i meant was that if the ones that believe that there is no heaven or hell are right then the way i believe will not matter. we will just die and thats it.

Thats assuming that it is only a choice between Christianity and Aethiesm. It is quite possible and indeed likely that both those choices are wrong. Perhaps we will find ourselves side by side in an Islamic Inspired Hell.

Since I originally mentioned I would hope but never pray if my child was terminally ill, after reading some more on these posts, I think that I would pray actually because like you say, what if he was real???? Maybe that big purple banana might just answer my prayer. Irish mentioned his personal challenge He came good on. You just never know I guess unless you try...

Not at all.

I guess I would belive if I had some, to me, undeniable proof.

But I would never worship a god or so, I guess its because I find it too silly. Look at yourself, would you not feel pathetic if you were the mightiest entity in the universe and you had created some lemming race JUST so they could worship you? to be... silly

Or a spot of tea in the Tibetan Bardo.

Our beliefs are always changing as we learn more about ourselves, others, and our interdependence. It takes an extreme event, or extreme proof for anyone to take a 180. I don't think that anyone who make the statement "I was x, but now I'm y." went to bed as completely x and woke up as completely y.

that's not true.plenty , even priests, have come to the conclusion God does not exist.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6199716.stm


I myself was raised catholic and believed in Jesus and even thought of becoming a nun when I was 15 -( untill I , well , educated myself). Looked at the precursors for christanity , looked at other religions objectively, and came to understand they are all pretty much fear based . Man afraid of being alone and trying to make sense of the world around him as to why things happen. Fear of death that arouse the need for belief that we don't die spiritually. and seeing how the rich and powerful use religion to gain more power and money as well as control people.

I still believe in god and still believe there is more than just this life , but as to what and why I figure I'll never get that answer here , not really , just someones' opinion and if there is no god or life after death then it won't matter anyway.

as for proof of truth in the bible - so this is truth?

here interracial marriage is wrong - Ezra 9:13-15


here is jesus god? less than god ? seems he can't decide.

Jesus consistently contradicts himself concerning his Godly status. "I and my father are one." (John 14:28) Also see Philippians 2:5-6 Those verses lead us to believe that he is a part of the trinity and equal to his father being a manifestation of him. Yet, Jesus also made many statements that deny he is the perfect men, much less God incarnate. Take the following for example: "Why callest thou me good? There is none good but one, that is God" (Matthew 19:17). "My father if greater then I." (John 14:28) Also see Matthew 24:26 Clearly, Jesus is denouncing the possibility of him being the Messiah in those three verses.

and Where is my slave? ( I'd prefer a Canadian , they are so easy to get along with )

However, you may purchase male or female slaves from among the foreigners who live among you. You may also purchase the children of such resident foreigners, including those who have been born in your land. You may treat them as your property, passing them on to your children as a permanent inheritance. You may treat your slaves like this, but the people of Israel, your relatives, must never be treated this way. (Leviticus 25:44-46 NLT)